EGYPT AND AUSTRIA IX (21 ST – 24 TH OCTOBER 2013), BETLIAR, SLOVAKIA AIGYPTOS FOUNDATION, SLOVAKIA (HTTP://AIGYPTOS.SK) – MUSEUM BETLIAR (WWW.SNM.SK) / CONTACT: EAA@AIGYPTOS.SK 1 EGYPT AND AUSTRIA IX, 2013 BETLIAR, SLOVAKIA PROGRAMME 21 ST TO 24 TH OCTOBER 2013 THE PERCEPTION OF THE ORIENT IN CENTRAL EUROPE (1800 – 1918) After the expedition of Napoleon Bonaparte to Egypt in 1798, Europeans increasingly began to encounter Near Eastern countries and to become acquainted with the cultures of the Orient. The conference seeks to examine the perception of the Orient, especially Egypt, in Central Europe during the 19 th century up to the First World War and the legacy of Egyptomania and Orientalism up to that time. The lectures should target cultural interactions but topics referring to political, economical and social relationships are welcomed as well. With special reference to the conference venue, attention should be given to travelling and collecting activities of the nobility from the countries of the former Austria-Hungary, that gave rise to libraries, artistic and archaeological collections and common knowledge about the Oriental world. FOR THE ORGANIZERS: Dr. Jozef Hudec (Aigyptos Foundation) Mag.phil. Ľubica Hudáková (Aigyptos Foundation) Mgr. Eva Lazárová (SNM Betliar) Mgr. Silvia Lörinčíková (SNM Betliar) SLOVAK NATIONAL MUSEUM BETLIAR MUSEUM The Aigyptos Foundation
Transcript
eGypt anD austria iX (21st – 24tH october 2013), betliar, sloVaKia
tHe perceptiOn Of tHe Orient in central eurOpe (1800 – 1918)
After the expedition of Napoleon Bonaparte to Egypt in 1798, Europeans increasingly began to encounter Near Eastern countries and to become acquainted with the cultures of the Orient. The conference seeks to examine the perception of the Orient, especially Egypt, in Central Europe during the 19th century up to the First World War and the legacy of Egyptomania and Orientalism up to that time. The lectures should target cultural interactions but topics referring to political, economical and social relationships are welcomed as well.With special reference to the conference venue, attention should be given to travelling and collecting activities of the nobility from the countries of the former Austria-Hungary, that gave rise to libraries, artistic and archaeological collections and common knowledge about the Oriental world.
for tHe orGaniZers:
Dr. Jozef Hudec (Aigyptos Foundation)Mag.phil. Ľubica Hudáková (Aigyptos Foundation)
Mgr. Eva Lazárová (SNM Betliar)Mgr. Silvia Lörinčíková (SNM Betliar)
SLOVAK NATIONAL MUSEUMBETLIAR MUSEUMThe Aigyptos
Foundation
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
22nd OctOber 2013 (tuesday) – cOnference rOOM, Office building Of tHe betliar MuseuM
09:00 – 10:30 guided tOur tHrOugH tHe ManOr-HOuse (in englisH)
10.30 – 11.00 cOffee break
egyptOMania
11.00 – 11.30 Leszek Zinkow (Cracow)Some remarks on Egyptomania in Galicia
11.30 – 12.00 Eszter Feró (Budapest)Pyramids in the “back garden”: Some remarks on Egyptomania in Hungary
12.00 – 13.30 luncH
Orientalist painting
13.30 – 14.00 Ágnes Mészáros (Budapest)Orient “on the spot” – Orient in a travel albumComparing lithographed picture tables in count Iván Forray’s album with their originals made on the journey
14.00 – 14.30 Vera Vasiljević (Belgrade)Orientalism oblige. A case study
14.30 – 15.00 Marta Herucová (Bratislava)The Story of the Diyarbakirli Tahsin’s Painting
15.00 – 15.30 cOffee break
16.00 – 20.00 Visit of the City Štítnik and RožňaVa
17.00 – 18.00 Jozef HudecSlováci a archeologické výskumy na Tell el-Retábí(lecture held in Slovak language for the public)
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
23st OctOber 2013 (Wednesday) – cOnference rOOM, Office building Of tHe betliar MuseuM
develOpMent Of “Oriental studies”
09:00 – 09:30 Clemens Gütl (Vienna)„Six degrees of separation?“: Rethinking social networks and knowledge production in 19th century Austrian-African relations
HistOry Of cOllectiOns
09.30 – 10.00 Jozef Hudec (Bratislava)Aegyptiaka in Slovakia – past and present
10.00 – 10.30 Patrik Derfiňák and Anton Fogaš (Prešov)Egyptian artifacts in the first private museum in Prešov
10.30 – 11.00 cOffee break
11.00 – 11.30 Katalin Kóthay (Budapest)Acquiring and collecting Egyptian antiquities in turn-of-the-century Hungary
11.30 – 12.00 Mladen Tomorad (Zagreb)Foundation of the Egyptian Collections in Croatia: Travellers, Private Collectors and Genesis of the Collections
12.00 – 12.30 Carlo Rindi (Prato)A hitherto unknown source by Giuseppe Nizzoli, Chancellor of the Austrian Consulate in Egypt (1818-1827)
12.30 – 14.00 luncH
14.30 – 17.30 Visit to the Andrássy Mausoleum and the Picture Gallery in Krásnohorské Podhradie
18.00 – 20.30 cOnference dinner in Rožňava(traditional Stone Cellar in the Hotel Čierny Orol***)
17.00 – 18.00 Lucia HulkováHatšepsut - žena na tróne faraónov (lecture held in Slovak language for the public)
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Pasquale Revoltella (Venice, 1795 – Trieste, 1869) was one of the most influential and representative of the imperial Trieste, which played a major role both in economic and political affairs. He began his career as a financier; he was one of the first shareholders of Assicurazioni Generali (founded in 1831) and a board member of the Österreichischer Lloyd (founded in 1833). His best efforts, however, was given to the support of the opening of the Suez Canal, which he considered crucial for the development of Trieste and his maritime trade. In 1858 he went to Paris to meet Ferdinand de Lesseps, who later on helped baron to become the Vice-President of Compagnie universelle du canal maritime de Suez in 1861. After that Revoltella visited Egypt and the working area of the Suez Canal. He came back with many memories and a diary, which will be presented in my paper.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
The Travelogue of the First Slovak Intellectual in Egypt - Ján
Roháček (1910)
Ľubica Hudáková and Martin OdlerInstitute of Egyptology, University of Vienna / Czech Institute of Egyptology, Charles University in [email protected] / [email protected]
The paper will discuss the travelogue of Ján Roháček (1869 – 1939) – a Slovak evangelical clergyman born in Stará Turá (Slovakia). Roháček studied in Switzerland and after returning to the homeland he worked as a preacher and missionary, devoting great part of his professional life to proclaiming the Gospel to the Romani people. In 1911 he moved to the Slovak-speaking village Kysáč in Vojvodina (Serbia) but a year before he managed to undertake a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. During this journey he also visited Egypt and his experiences were published in the journal Svetlo [Light] and in 1912 as a book named Cesta do Egypta a Palestíny [Journey to Egypt and Palestine]. Roháček can be considered the first Slovak intellectual who visited Egypt before the First World War and put his impressions in writing. Furthermore, his work can be compared to the travelogues written by the Austrian theologian and historian Johann Fahrngruber (1845 – 1901).
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Marko Frelih and Vesna PodržajSlovene Ethnographic Museum, [email protected]
Several Slovenes travelled to Africa under the organization of missionaries, led by dr. Ignacij Knoblehar in the mid-19th century. They boarded the ship in Trieste and sailed to Alexandria and then towards Cairo. They visited biblical sites in Cairo and wrote home describing their experiences. Interest for the Holy land grew during the second half of the 19th century, mostly due to group pilgrimages. First travelogues of biblical places in Egypt and Palestine were published in Slovene language at the time. In 1910 about 540 people went on an adventurous pilgrimage to the Holy land. The photographic documentation is currently at the Slovene Ethnographic Museum.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Letters from Niš on Harems and Letters from Egypt by Jelena
Dimitrijević (1862-1945)
Danijela StefanovićFaculty of Philosophy, University of [email protected]
Serbian writer Jelena Dimitrijević (1862–1945) travelled extensively – from Turkey, the Middle East (Egypt, Syria, and The Holy Land), India and the Far East to England, Spain, France and the USA. The images and impressions of the East, or Orient, and the West, as well as of the Oriental women, are essential for her writings. Dimitrijević was highly interested in the oriental way of living, focussing especially on the fate of women, both in their traditional social structures, as well as in the various process of their ‘emancipation’. Dimitrijević’ first works were concerned with women in her immediate surroundings, in the ‘oriental’ setting of southern Serbia, still dominated entirely by the Turkish / Oriental way of life. This applies particularly to her Letters from Niš on Harems (1897), with the focus on the situation of Muslim women in the turbulent period they were living through at the turn of the century, when individuals had to decide whether or not to ‘emancipate’ – i.e. to discard their veils, to pursue education, and to adopt more independent lifestyle. Her experience of the ‘Orient’, and her understanding of the ‘Orient’, was presented also in her other works, such as Letters from Salonika (1918), Letters from India (1928), and Letters from Egypt (1929).The works by Jelena Dimitrijević which will be discussed in the present paper are Letters from Niš on Harems, and Letters from Egypt.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
The German Princess Mechtilde Lichnowsky (1879–1958) and the Romanian Princess Marthe Bibesco (1888–1973) were celebrated writers and outstanding personalities of their time. In 1912 Mechtilde Lichnowsky travelled with her husband, Prince Karl Max Lichnowsky, to Egypt. In 1930 due to poor health Marthe Bibesco undertook a journey to Egypt. Both of them wrote remarkable and in many ways unusual travel novels which later became great successes in their own time (Lichnowsky: Götter, Könige und Tiere in Ägypten; Bibesco: Jour d`Egypte). In my paper I would like to analyse and compare their impressions of Egypt as well as their experiences. Special attention will be given also to their encounters with archaeologists and antique-dealers during their stay in Egypt.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Ludmila Matiegková and Her (Early) Perceptions of the Orient
Hana HavlůjováFaculty of Education, Charles University in [email protected]
Ludmila Matiegková (1889 – 1960) was a private Czech woman scholar of Egyptology who visited Egypt three times and travelled in Palestine in 1920s. Until very recently only her writings from the later 1920s and early 1930s (e.g. letters, the articles on Egyptology or the popular novel of travel), which reflected her perception of the Orient, were available to study. However, the situation changed when the Archive of the Charles University in Prague obtained a new acquisition of personal papers of Ludmila Matiegková at the end of the year 2012. New collection comprises for instance interesting travel photographs taken in Egypt or scholar’s notes. Moreover, the personal diary of Ludmila Matiegková that covers five turbulent years of finishing of her university studies and entering the profession (1910 – 1915) is also available. In general, the paper aims to overview that new archive material. In particular, the diary and other relevant resources will be analysed in order to map the early perceptions of the Orient produced by young lady who was dreaming in 1911: ‘And once, if only I could become an associate professor of Egyptology ...’
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Constructing Oriental „Other“ in „parallel“ travel diaries of
Jiří and Růžena Baum
Lucie StorchováInstitute of Philosophy of the Czech Academy of [email protected]
My paper will deal with ways in which the „Islamic Orient“ was constructed in the „parallel“ travel diaries kept by famous Czech globetrotters cooperating with the National Museum in Prague, Dr. Jiří Baum and his wife Růžena, during their travels through Africa in the late 1930s. Besides both the level of argumentation and figurative speech, special attention will be paid to period´s discourses intersecting in Baums´ representations of the landscape, local cultural phenomena, and inhabitants (such as race, social distinction, gender, bodily difference, etc.). As far as the fact is concerned, both diaries – preserved in manuscript form in the Archive of the National Museum – were written on a regularly basis, even in the same times and places, it is further worth discussing how they differ. In the next step, the more general question arises: how period´s „discursive pressures“ (S. Mills) could have influenced the ways in which the „same“ travel experience was represented by more travel writers.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Galicia (Polish Galicja, Ukrainian Halychyna, German Galizien; Hungarian Gácsország or Halics; Czech / Slovak Halič) is a historical region in Central and Eastern Europe, now within Polish and Ukrainian borders, and in the years 1772-1918 a part of the Habsburg Monarchy, the Austrian Empire and Austria-Hungary as the north-eastern borderland of that superpower. Despite its characteristics as ‘the countryside’ it also had a clear cultural specificity: the tradition of Polish heritage, with an element of fascination with French culture (and a strong Napoleonic bias), traditions of ancient oriental connections of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the obvious multifaceted relationships with Vienna. Galicia had two significant metropolises (and at the same time academic centers) – Cracow and Lviv. The article provides initial insight into the important questions of the relationships between the nineteenth-century Galicia with Egypt; travel, collecting Egyptian antiquities by museums, and the beginnings of scientific studies (one of the pioneers of the Austro-Hungarian Egyptology was Tadeusz Smoleński, whose associations with Cracow are evident), as well as – or perhaps predominantly – the intriguing manifestations of Egyptomania, for example in architecture and arts.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
A great number of studies have already been published, which investigate the influence of the Ancient Egyptian cultural heritage on the Western European art and culture-history. This phenomenon called Egyptomania, blew from the time of Roman emperors and then in the court of Renaissance popes and noble banker families in Northern Italy. In the case of Central Europe, Hungary dropped out from the initial phase due to the permanent wars against the Ottoman Empire. However, Egyptomania experienced a new wave after the Napoleon expedition in Egypt, which also had some Hungarian members, like Sámuel Decsy, who summarised his experiences in a book. At the same time Turkish conquerors had been expelled and the Hungarian nobility could join the new trends. Former studies examined the connections of Hungarian-Egyptian diplomacy and the development of art collections or the relation between the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the Khedivate. We also have much information about the development of Egyptological studies in Hungary. The main issue of my paper is to investigate the material presence of Egyptomania from the 18th to the early 20th century in Hungarian fine art and architecture. In addition I focus on the following questions: what kind of objects are these and how they fit in the general trends of European „mania”; who made and who ordered that works and what social status they had. My purpose is to discover also the origin of the background conceptions that might shed new light upon our sight of Egyptomania in Hungary.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
This presentation is going to be a direct continuation of Ľubica Hudáková‘s talk on count Iván Forray‘s travel album, given at the conference “Crossroads of Egyptology” in Prague, 2010. The travel album relates in pictures and in words the journey that count Iván Forray took in 1842 through Italy and Malta to Egypt in the company of two other Hungarian noblemen and a Viennese artist, Joseph Heicke (1811-1861; “Tier- und Landschaftmaler”), hired as an official painter. Count Forray, being an amateur artist himself, also made numerous sketches on the journey. When Forray‘s mother decided to publish a travel album (to commemorate his only son who died unexpectedly and prematurely), again, it was Heicke whom she asked to make the lithographed picture tables after Iván‘s original drawings.Research I have been doing recently, aims at tracing Heicke’s as well as Forray’s original drawings and watercolours, also Heicke´s related paintings made in the following years and exhibited at the Akademie der bildenden Künste in Vienna. Some of these works are kept in public collections (Hungarian National Gallery, Albertina, Wien Museum), but most of them are in private ownership. A close look at the originals and a comparison with the lithographs will provide an opportunity to discuss the differences between the attitude toward the Orient of a professional painter and of an art-loving traveller; also, will throw new light upon and will help to reassess Heicke’s role as a lithographer.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Vera VasiljevićDepartment of Archaeology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of [email protected]
In the Nineteenth century, academic and public discursive mechanism constructed the prevailing view - the one of the superiority of the Western culture, which was represented as being on the top of the evolutionary development. The attitude of the Orientalist painters towards the subject of their paintings contributed to this view. The Orient they portrayed was frozen in time, exotic and underdeveloped. Although some of the countries that were part of the Turkish Empire made considerable efforts to develop industry and modernize their institutions, this was never acknowledged in European Orientalist painting, and was only seldom documented in the contemporary photography. The painters constructed their paintings, using elements from photographs, their own sketches or studies, or those of other artists emphasizing the alien, picturesque, quaint. Their themes reflected not only their personal interest, but above all the art market demands.Paja Jovanović (Pavle/Paul/Pal Joanowitch), a Serbian artist born in Vršac, Banat (1859-1957), one of the students of Leopold Carl Müller, during his lifetime was renowned for his painted portraits of the elite, historical and Oriental scenes. The way he used themes and settings he shared with some other Orientalists exemplifies that the key factor in the choice of motifs and their elements was the presumed taste of the targeted customers from the social elite, with little or no interest for the realities of the Orient in situ. In my presentation I will compare some of his works thematically related to Egypt with other Orientalist paintings made by different authors, while examining in some detail the realities of the portrayed country.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Marta HerucováInstitute of History of Art, Slovak Academy of [email protected]
Diyarbakirli Tahsin (1874 – 1937) was an interesting Turkish painter and musician. One of his paintings, made in the year 1919, came into possession of Karol Wein – owner of the textile factory in Kežmarok. Nowadays it is in a private collection in Bratislava as an exclusive example of Turkish impressionism in Slovakia. The story of this painting and the painting itself was unknown until now. Diyarbakirli Tahsin’s life as well as the tale of the painting’s arrival to Bratislava will be included into the paper.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
„Six degrees of separation?“: Rethinking social networks and
knowledge production in 19th century Austrian-African relations
Clemens GütlDepartment of African Studies, University of [email protected]
Simon Leo Reinisch (1832–1919) is a well known scientist and celebrated pioneer of Egyptology, African and Mexican Studies in Austria. Thus there is no urgent need to retell his life neither in a chronological order nor in detail. I would rather like to draw my attention to the possible meaning of interactions between individuals, groups and institutions for the production and distribution of knowledge from Africa in Europe taking Reinisch just as a concrete example. Nevertheless my paper will focus on questions concerning methods, strategies and concepts within the development of „Oriental Studies“ in Austria and should therefore allow a more general discussion about the collection and use of different kinds of data from Africa in Central Europe.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Jozef HudecAigyptos Foundation / Institute of Oriental Studies, Slovak Academy of [email protected]
The contribution deals with history and current situation of Ancient Egyptian artefacts in the collections of several museums in Slovak cities Bratislava, Betliar, Levice, Nitra, Prievidza and Rimavská Sobota.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Egyptian artifacts in the first private museum in Prešov
Patrik Derfiňák and Anton FogašInstitute of History, University of Prešov / Department of Geography and Regional Development, University of Preš[email protected] / [email protected]
During the first half of the 19th century appeared in Prešov, an important centre of political, cultural and economic life of the region Šariš, several collectors specializing in ancient and medieval art and numismatics. One of them was the founder of the first private museum in this area, Gabriel Fejérváry (1780-1851). In addition to his extensive collection of Egyptian, Greek, Roman and Indian artifacts, part of his collection was a library of several thousand volumes. Several prominent Hungarian scholars studied at him from these materials such as I. Henzelmann or F. Pulszky. The collection and the collector himself has attracted considerable attention thanks to his extensive travels abroad and purchases of antiques throughout Europe. Fejérváry tried to preserve the collection and passed it on to his nephew F. Pulszki, who unfortunatelly, had to sell off the majority of it while in exile in the 1850s.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
The paper focuses on three Hungarian collectors/patrons of Egyptian antiquities, who lived at the turn of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries: 1) literary critic, academic, and writer Zsolt Beöthy, 2) Cistercian monk, teacher and scholar Bonifác Platz, and 3) entrepreneur Fülöp (Philipp) Back. The conservative Calvinist nobleman (Beöthy), the Roman Catholic priest of German descent (Platz), and the patriotic Hungarian Jew (Back) represent three characteristic types of the Hungarian educated elite of the period. The study of their personal motives and strategies to acquire Egyptian antiquities on the one hand, and the investigation of their different social backgrounds on the other, will serve to illustrate the roles of collecting Egyptian antiquities in the intellectual culture of the period, as well as to shed light on a particular element of the importance of cultural property within a contemporaneous national context.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Foundation of the Egyptian Collections in Croatia: Travellers,
Private Collectors and Genesis of the Collections
Mladen TomoradDepartment of History, Croatian Studies, University of [email protected]
The most of Croatian Oriental and Ancient Egyptian collections were found during the 19th and early 20th century. Currently in Croatian museum and private collections great number of Ancient Egyptian antiquities are kept. The number can be estimated between four and five thousand. The biggest and the best known collection is kept in the Archaeological museum in Zagreb (ex-National museum). It was found in the early 1860’s from the great number of private collectors, noblemen, noble families, wealthy citizens etc. (e.g. Mihael Barić, Franjo Jordan, Josip Forz Kožalić, Juraj Haulik, Gustav Koritić …). Other museums also have the great number of Ancient Egyptian artefacts which were mostly donated to those institutions by local Maecenas and merchants who travelled to Egypt and Orient (e.g. Ivo Nordeli, brothers Amerling, noble family Pasthory-Varady etc.). In these paper author will try to give short overview of genesis of these collections with known details of their donators. The whole subject is part of my long study of the Ancient Egyptian collections in Croatian museum and private collections which started in 1999.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
The so-called Age of the Consuls, during the first years of Egyptology, was crowded by several outstanding personalities. Amongst them, Giuseppe Nizzoli is doubtlessly one of the most fascinating as well as one of the most frequently neglected (1). Nonetheless, he played a leading role in the formation of some of the most important collections of Egyptian antiquities in Austria and Italy.Recently, a new manuscript document has come to light (2), allowing to discover previously unknown details concerning the Chancellor and his collections. This paper intends to investigate this new evidence.
(1) Only in the last years a few studies have finally been published, shedding some light on his personal life. See for instance S. Daris, Giuseppe Nizzoli, Un impiegato consolare austriaco nel Levante agli albori dell’Egittologia, Napoli, 2005; S. Daris, Un noto sconosciuto nella storia dell’egittologia: Giuseppe Nizzoli, in Archeografo Triestino vol. 69 (2009), ser. IV, pp. 351-371.(2) The document, constituted by a hand-written letter, has been discovered by the present writer.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
The Perception of the Orient by Austrian Diplomatic Elites
during Vormärz
Miroslav ŠedivýDepartment of Historical Science, University of West [email protected]
The goal of the paper is to explain the attitudes of Austrian diplomatic elites towards the Orient during Vormärz, in particular towards Islam, explain the factors which influenced them and compare them with significantly different opinions expressed by chosen members of French intellectual circles, some of them designated by Omar Said as the exponents of Orientalism.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
The former British colonists were barely Americans when the French invaded Egypt under Napoleon Bonaparte. In 1804, Barbary pirates (corruption of Berber) from the states of Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Tripoli (today’s Libya) had been infesting the shipping lanes in the Mediterranean and exacting tribute from European traders. Among those being forced to pay were the newly established United States of America. Once protected by Great Britain, they now had to face the problem alone. By 1795, the Americans had begrudgingly paid the Barbary pirates a sum in excess of $900,000. Action was inevitable. Among the operations, authorized by President Thomas Jefferson to handle the problem, was an overseas expedition, which landed in Alexandria in 1804. It was led by William Eaton, a flamboyant, problematic New Englander. Later writers were fond of enveloping him in flowing Arab robes and placing a whirling scimitar in his hands – a forerunner of Lawrence of Arabia, indeed a highly romantic image. In Alexandria he organized a motley expedition of disaffected Arabs, a detachment of US Marines and a host of unruly Greek mercenaries. The trek took them along the coast of Egypt and Libya. Their goal – the capture of Derna. It was a march through hell. Nevertheless, the encounter managed to set traditions for the Marines that endure even today.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Angela BlaschekInstitute of Egyptology, University of [email protected]
In 1898, a small book was edited entitled „Vier Monate im Orient, Reiseskizzen von F.G.H“. While researching the abbreviation in the book’s title, I discovered that the author was Count Franz Harrach (Franz Graf Harrach), a Bohemian aristocrat, who lived in the castle “Velké Meziříčí” near Brno. Harrach travelled several times to Egypt. He was well-known for being an escort to the Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand von Österreich-Este during his journey to Bosnia in 1914. He was also an eye-witness to the assassination attempt at Sarajevo.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Some Remarks on Crown Prince Rudolf’s Orientreise of 1881
Helmut SatzingerInstitute of Egyptology, University of [email protected]
Early in 1881, at the age of 22 years, Crown Prince Rudolf embarked on a journey to Egypt and Palestine. He was accompanied by a small, but illustrious entourage; among others, by has uncle, Archduke Carl Salvator of the Tuscany line, and counts Waldburg and Hoyos. When comparing with modern ways of travelling in these countries, it may seem strange that hunting played a prominent role in that journey. Rudolf was probably not a passionate hunter. But on the one hand, it was an aristocratic custom to have also this sort of activities in such jouneys; and on the other, the Crown Prince had a great interest in zoology. This can be seen here in the meticulous classification and documentation, as well as in his interest in taxidermic preparation of the booty.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
Hunting expeditions for Africa were very popular in the 19th and 20th century. I would like to focus on the leaders who prepared the expeditions. The expeditions were prepared from the very beginning - transport of the group from Europe to Africa, then to Sudan etc., preparing the permission and licences, plan for hunting, arranging an accommodation or finding an excellent cook. Collections of papers and photographs of three leaders of these expeditions (Vilém Němec, Bedřich Machulka, Eduard Štorch) are preserved in the Náprstek museum in Prague.
Egypt and austria iX (21st – 24th OctObEr 2013), bEtliar, slOvakia
